Moment of Lift

 

"Women of Eureka Springs"

photo credit: Richard Quick

Few things bring me more sorrow than to hear of a fine woman running for public office being called a baby killer. I'm reading a book by Melinda Gates titled "The Moment of Lift". In this informative and frank writing, she tells of visiting African countries and realizing what was holding people in their poverty-stricken lives. She saw women carrying water on their heads and babies in their arms, while the men sat and smoked and told stories. She talked to women about their lives, and time and again it came back to the fact that they had no control over how many babies they had. Maybe they were too young, or too old, or too sick to be having a baby, but they had no choice. Oddly enough, many were expected to have as many children as possible because most of them would die. And herein lay the solution: better health care, more abundant birth control, and education were the keys to uplifting these and other societies. This is what her foundation has been doing for more than a decade. For those who believe abortion should be illegal, I urge them to watch the PBS series, "Call the Midwife". This is a show about Catholic nuns and nurses dealing with the same issues -- lack of birth control, education, and health care -- but in 1960s England. What a difference it has made to get these issues out into the open, discuss them, and find solutions! No one wants to abort a pregnancy, and it hurts me when I hear people say that Democrats love abortions. This type of disconnect must stop. How? Education, empathy, facts, truth, love: those are the antidotes as I see them. We must talk about these things and understand that organizations such as Planned Parenthood contribute to lower abortion rates, not higher. Let's choose love over fear!

"Think of this, dear reader, for it will lift the sackcloth from your eyes, and you will behold the soft-winged dove descending upon you. The very circumstance, which your suffering sense deems wrathful and afflictive, Love can make an angel entertained unawares." 

Mary Baker Eddy - Science & Health Page 574:25